Hi All,
So finally I have all the bits for my tank, and it actually has water in it! Apologies for the poor pictures, turns out the camera on the G1 is as bad as that on the iPhone!
Equipment:
Tank: Juwel Rio 180
Filtration: Juwel Internal + Tetratec EX700
Substrate: Caribsea Eco-Complete
CO2: 2kg FE, Wave Reg+Solenoid, Rhinox 2000 Diffuser
Ferts: TPN+
Hardscape: Big old piece of wood!
Plants: Glosso, Blyxa Japonica, Anubias, Java Fern, Tiger Lily, Pogostemon Helferi
So the tank arrived the other day, and I first started by putting together the stand. It was confusing to begin with, as I seemed to have instructions for about seven different stands... but eventually I managed it.
The tank was massive compared to our other two...
Unfortunately, Royal Mail failed to deliver my regulator on time, and my plants hadn't arrived yet, so it would be a few days before I could fill it up.
So yesterday finally the plants arrived, along with the regulator and a few other bits and pieces, so, much to my girlfriends dismay, I started to go about making a mess of the living room.
My initial 'vision' was sketchy - I knew I wanted a Glosso carpet along the front, and the Blyxa behind the wood. The lily would go near the Juwel filter, hopefully obscuring it a bit, and the wood would have the anubias and java fern attached to the main part of it.
I think I managed this for the most part however I learnt a few lessons, namely that you should attach ferns and similar plants to hardscape BEFORE it is in the tank... Also, that my girlfriend has a lot more patience than me when it comes to the fiddly business of tying stuff onto things, and that if you get anough of it stuck to your hands and then wash them, eco-complete will bung up your sink.
Anyway, after the water had cleared a little bit, this is what it looked like:
Right-hand side.
Left-hand side.
The middle.
My view from the sofa.
No CO2 yet, as I didn't have time to put it in last night - that is tonight's job. (By the way, thanks for the FE's Dan, most appreciated!)
Predictably, I now have a couple of questions - any advice would be really appreciated.
- Planting the glosso in the eco-complete was difficult. What I did was separate the plants into individual stems (each one was quite long), and put them almost horixontally in the substrate, probably 1-2cm deep. I left them showing a couple of leaves on the surface, but since the water went in they have rearranged themselves and many stems are showing 1cm-2cm if stem above the eco-complete (I think you can see how they are in the photos.) Will they be fine like this? Should I try and push them further in? Any thoughts?
- I keep looking at it and wondering if I haven't planted enough? I was wary of planting too much this time as I planted lots of Hygro Polysperma in my Rekord, not realising that it would 'fill in' so quickly (subsequently the lower leaves rotted away) - have I got enough plant mass in there?
- There are no fish in there at the moment, and I am setting up the CO2 tonight. How many bps should I start it on? I have a drop checker on order, it arrived a few days ago in fact, but the postman managed to smash it in my letter box (came all the way from the other side of the world, only for the postie to force it through the door and break it, nightmare!) so I don't have a reliable way of measuring the CO2 until its replacement arrives (should be in the next couple of days) but I understand that without fish to gas, I don't need to worry too much?
Any advice/criticism would be welcomed....
Thanks everyone for the help so far, no doubt I'll have a wealth of questions over the next few weeks...
Matt
So finally I have all the bits for my tank, and it actually has water in it! Apologies for the poor pictures, turns out the camera on the G1 is as bad as that on the iPhone!
Equipment:
Tank: Juwel Rio 180
Filtration: Juwel Internal + Tetratec EX700
Substrate: Caribsea Eco-Complete
CO2: 2kg FE, Wave Reg+Solenoid, Rhinox 2000 Diffuser
Ferts: TPN+
Hardscape: Big old piece of wood!
Plants: Glosso, Blyxa Japonica, Anubias, Java Fern, Tiger Lily, Pogostemon Helferi
So the tank arrived the other day, and I first started by putting together the stand. It was confusing to begin with, as I seemed to have instructions for about seven different stands... but eventually I managed it.
The tank was massive compared to our other two...
Unfortunately, Royal Mail failed to deliver my regulator on time, and my plants hadn't arrived yet, so it would be a few days before I could fill it up.
So yesterday finally the plants arrived, along with the regulator and a few other bits and pieces, so, much to my girlfriends dismay, I started to go about making a mess of the living room.
My initial 'vision' was sketchy - I knew I wanted a Glosso carpet along the front, and the Blyxa behind the wood. The lily would go near the Juwel filter, hopefully obscuring it a bit, and the wood would have the anubias and java fern attached to the main part of it.
I think I managed this for the most part however I learnt a few lessons, namely that you should attach ferns and similar plants to hardscape BEFORE it is in the tank... Also, that my girlfriend has a lot more patience than me when it comes to the fiddly business of tying stuff onto things, and that if you get anough of it stuck to your hands and then wash them, eco-complete will bung up your sink.
Anyway, after the water had cleared a little bit, this is what it looked like:
Right-hand side.
Left-hand side.
The middle.
My view from the sofa.
No CO2 yet, as I didn't have time to put it in last night - that is tonight's job. (By the way, thanks for the FE's Dan, most appreciated!)
Predictably, I now have a couple of questions - any advice would be really appreciated.
- Planting the glosso in the eco-complete was difficult. What I did was separate the plants into individual stems (each one was quite long), and put them almost horixontally in the substrate, probably 1-2cm deep. I left them showing a couple of leaves on the surface, but since the water went in they have rearranged themselves and many stems are showing 1cm-2cm if stem above the eco-complete (I think you can see how they are in the photos.) Will they be fine like this? Should I try and push them further in? Any thoughts?
- I keep looking at it and wondering if I haven't planted enough? I was wary of planting too much this time as I planted lots of Hygro Polysperma in my Rekord, not realising that it would 'fill in' so quickly (subsequently the lower leaves rotted away) - have I got enough plant mass in there?
- There are no fish in there at the moment, and I am setting up the CO2 tonight. How many bps should I start it on? I have a drop checker on order, it arrived a few days ago in fact, but the postman managed to smash it in my letter box (came all the way from the other side of the world, only for the postie to force it through the door and break it, nightmare!) so I don't have a reliable way of measuring the CO2 until its replacement arrives (should be in the next couple of days) but I understand that without fish to gas, I don't need to worry too much?
Any advice/criticism would be welcomed....
Thanks everyone for the help so far, no doubt I'll have a wealth of questions over the next few weeks...
Matt